The first week. The week of firsts

  Yangji, Korea Rep.
Monday, October 8, 2007

· Yangji, South Korea
· GMT +8:00 hours

Running to a Schedule
It's been a while. So much for my claim a few entries ago that the updates would be coming "thick and fast and on a regular basis". Umm, I should have known better than to make such a stupid statement, even if I remember scripting it and you don't remember reading it. It's been a while since I last turned my attentions to my beloved Travelpod. A week actually, although it seems like an eternity. I don't like things that come between myself and my Travelpod, especially if it's any form of employment. And there in lies my excuse - work. Yep, we're actually back on a payroll, and who cares if we've no idea, as yet, when payday is (or even if we'll get paid at all); the bottom line is we're employed again and our days, for the first time in months, are spent following a routine - rising, eating and sleeping at the same time day after day. It feels kind of weird really, but with the first week of employment under our belts (always the hardest one) already we're looking forward to the second. Yep, things are going well, so let's go over what has been an eventful week, a week of many firsts for both of us.

Day 48 - September 30th 2007

01 Pickup

Finally a day with a purpose had arrived. With a strange sort of unknown excitement inside we made our way to our rendezvous point in Seoul with the Henkster (picture 01). We were early for the 1pm pickup, no doubt a sign of our eagerness to get on with things having spent the past week in Seoul with little to do. Our contact was Yoon Seok (pronounced 'young suck') a nice young Korean with decent English and only a few months removed from his dreaded compulsory 2-year stint with the Korean military (they got to have an army to call on if the North ever decides to wander south). At this stage of the proceedings we were not quiet sure what Yoon Seok's role was to be, aside from meeting us at the rendezvous point, buying us a coffee and guiding us across the road to the waiting taxi for the 45 minute trip south to Yangji, our base for the near future. Over the next few hours we came to realise that we, all three of us, comprise the full complement of teaching staff, that there are to be 27 students split amongst the 3 classes (all employees of Korea Express, a Korean logistics company, a Korean DHL or UPS if you like) and that we are to spend the next 10 weeks in the middle of nowhere, or as near as one can be to the middle of nowhere in built-up Korea. We also realised that we'd better quickly get used to 3 square Korean meals a day. Not to worry; at least staff meetings won't be too hard to organise.

Echo Green Town

03 The Honeymoon Cabin, part II

02 The Honeymoon Cabin

Our home base here in Yangji, both for work and living, is Echo Green Town. We looked at the website before getting here and were quite anxious to see it for real. It's a strange sort of place, 15 minutes walk from the nearest store (a tiny, not very convenient, convenience store) on the outskirts of a Korean town called Yangji, a 30-45 minute drive south-east of Seoul. From what we can tell it's a sort of echo-friendly corporate weekend retreat, somewhere Koreans come on mass with their colleagues to let their hair down. The site houses 3 large, communal, open-plan style log cabins, each with a capacity to sleep 15 or so people.

04 Don't look right

We soon learnt that these would, during the week, double as our classrooms and as sleeping quarters for both us (in one of the cabins) and the students (in the other two). On weekends, whether we wanted them or not, two of three small cabins also found on-site (pictures 02, 03 & 04) would be reserved for our use.

05 Woodies or Rona

There is wood everywhere, in areas the place smells like a pine forest and if you wanted to, or were that way inclined, you could spend days counting the growth rings on the thousands of huge wooden beams what makeup the walls of the larger cabins. The whole echo vibe is rounded off by a gazebo (picture 05), water features, trees and chirping caged birds which, combined with the ever present sound of Korean folk music being piped around the site, push the chill out meter into overdrive. But this is Korea after all and no matter how much wood they try to surround you with one is never too far from some huge, sterile industrial unit complete with doggy paint scheme, a sea of tarmac and army of Hyundai trucks, just like the one towering behind our cosy weekend cabin. It'll be interesting to spend almost 3 months here. We'll tell at the end of the stay if we love it or hate it. Judgment is reserved thus far.

Arnolds
We were hoping that there would have been some sort of a gym here at Echo Green Town. But no. While I wouldn't be one of those large-necked, pneumatic-looking buffoons who inhabit the heavy-weight corner of every gym, I am someone who likes to keep in shape and was a gym 4-5 times a week guy during my time in Canada. It's almost 3 months since I last saw the inside of one, three months in which I haven't lifted anything heaver than my backpack (or Meg) or ran any further than the width of a train station platform. We know for sure there is a gym in the Camp Korea premises in Chun Cheon, about 2 hours east of here. The only problem is we won't get to call there home until early January, by which time I'll be looking more Arnold Palmer, less Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Day 49 - October 1st 2007

07 Breakfast. Looks awfully like dinner

The first day of October corresponded to our first day of work. The day began ominously - with the delivery of a Korean breakfast of rice (of course), salted fish, egg soup and the usual combination of communal dishes all containing some type of spicy greens (picture 07). I'd like to say that I didn't eat any of it because of the apprehension over the coming day, but

08 Paula, Simon & Randy

I'd be lying. I discovered long ago that my body will never be able for such food first thing in the morning, no matter how hard I try to 'Koreanize' it. To my surprise Meg managed a bit of it, but she stayed well away from the fish. Good girl. I mentioned in an entry a few days after arriving in Korea how we had yet to sample a traditional Korean meal. Well, we're making up for it now. Something tells me we'll be loosing a bit of weight over the coming weeks. The rest of the day was spent meeting our students, which we did while subjecting each and every one of them to an American Idol type interview (picture 08) and the evening, after our latest fix of rice and spicy greens, was spent lesson planning for the following day. Oh, the chore of work.

Day 50 - October 2nd 2007

09 Yes PM

On the 50th day of 'The Honeymoon' the Korean food challenge continued, meaning we're not eating much. The camp officials seem to be noticing and have offered to give us a 'western' type breakfast. Great. It'll be interesting to see what is served to us in the morning, assuming we haven't died of malnourishment in the meantime. The 50th day of 'The Honeymoon' also marked the first full day of lessons, and our first time teaching adults. It didn't take long to realise teaching Korean adults is almost the same as teaching Korean kids, with just a few subtle differences - the adults are more attentive, discipline isn't an issue and they actually do what they are told. The days lessons went well for all of us and, while I'm aware there is a long way to go, I think I might already be well on the way to pulling off the impossible - convincing my students and the lone on-site boss, a.k.a. The Professor (or John), that I actually know what I'm doing. Lessons were broken up in the afternoon by the buzz of excitement that a visit to Echo Green Town by the ex-PM of Korea caused (picture 09). She seemed to think the place would be a good location for a small scale cabinet meeting, not that it looked like one to us (a small scale cabinet meeting that is). Myself and Meg, well aware of our visa issues and the fact that legally we shouldn't be working at all, couldn't help but laugh at the irony of being snapped in numerous pictures with someone who has some sort of a say in running the country. In the evening myself, Meg and Henk convened an emergency staff meeting to discuss what we, the teaching staff, deemed a unbalanced schedule; one we were presented with by the camp organisers and one that has the students in lessons daily from 9am to 6pm with only a one and a half hour break. It was a schedule we realised, after only one day in class, is overbearing and isn't conducive to learning. So we drafted up a revised schedule for review by The Professor, a schedule that had extracurricular activities, cunningly labeled as 'English Free Talk' sessions, neatly breaking up the afternoon lessons. It remains to be seen if our schedule gets the nod of approval.

Day 51 - October 3rd 2007

11 Fore!

10 Stick out yer bum

Thankfully our stomachs hadn't shrunk enough over the previous few days to prevent us from enjoying the delights of our first 'western' breakfast - sweet bread rolls and a fried egg. While it doesn't sound much it was a welcome change from dried fish and rice breakfast we'd picked at the previous few days. Of course there is still no avoiding Korean food come lunch or dinner time. But that's okay; we're well able for it by then, our systems haven fully woken up. The day also saw my class (Meg's class stayed doing lessons) take an afternoon visit to a nearby driving range (pictures 10 & 11), my first ever time to a range and the first time I've ever hit a golf ball (and I've hit thousands in 10 years or so I've been playing the game) using the correct grip (honest). Lessons were freely given by The Professor, a certified golf instructor (these guys are full of surprises), and I'll be making sure to pay the range a few visits over the coming weeks in an attempt to hone my newfound skills.

Day 52 - October 4th 2007

12 Party

Today's first saw me playing billiards. I'm not quiet sure what's happening to lessons, but in the afternoon I was taken to play billiards by my students. It was probably as a

13 Getting fuzzier

result of telling them the previous afternoon that I liked playing pool. Either that or they are just looking for a way to dodge lessons which, admittedly for them, are torturous in the afternoon having suffered through the morning lessons. It actually was an eventful 'activity' for all of us as I got to experience a totally new kind of cue game and my students

14 Almost bed time

had to speak quite a bit of English to explain the rules of the game to me. That evening we had a students and staff BBQ and, in typical Korean style, it quickly descended into a right good session, but only for those willing and able (pictures 12, 13 & 14). I was able, but not very willing. Not that that mattered; I don't remember going to bed.

Days 53, 54 & 55 - October 5th, 6th & 7th 2007
Mercifully Friday rolled around and we bid adieu to the students for the weekend at 3pm that afternoon

15 Cuite

(lessons end early on a Friday to help the students beat the chronic Korean weekend traffic). Our stomachs didn't know what was happening when we feasted on a pizza ordered in for us by camp management that afternoon and we spent the rest of the afternoon and evening sleeping and watching DVD's. The plan of a quiet weekend was wrecked Saturday morning by seemingly never-ending computer problems, problems that saw us making the trek into Seoul looking for a Windows XP CD. In a city lined with stall after stall of bootleg DVD's we found it impossible, and annoyingly frustrating, not to be able to get

16 Keeping her eye on the ball

a bootleg version of XP (we were told "it's illegal" ... go figure). As frustrating as that was however it was nowhere near as frustrating as having to go in search of the CD in the first place

17 Convincing?

(the one I brought with me, in case issues of the type I'm experiencing arose, was damaged somewhere between here and Ireland). We took advantage of being in the city to stock up on a few groceries, and we soon realized doing so is as expensive in Korea as it is in Ireland or Canada. Sunday, today, saw us lesson plan for the coming week (picture 15), pay our second visit to the driving range (we had to pay for ourselves this time... pictures 16 & 17), continue to try resolve our computer issues and come to the conclusion that, yes, the sporting world really is screwed up, with both New Zealand & Australia loosing in the final 8 of The Rugby World Cup and both Philadelphia & Colorado, perennial losers, making it to the baseball playoffs.

Until next time
So that was our first week here as part of the KE Global Challenge programme at Echo Green Town in Yangji. There's not much more to add except that no, nobody has mentioned our visa situation to us as yet. Here's wondering if they will at all? Make sure you check out the pictures and we'll be reporting on our progress next week having completed our second week of work, assuming we haven't been deported in the meantime.